Laura (the name is fictitious) is 36 years old and, 15 years after a cancer diagnosis, she has managed to fulfill her dream of motherhood, thanks to reimplantation of the ovarian tissue that had been removed and cryopreserved before the therapies. At 21 she discovered she had the Ewing’s sarcomaa rare malignant neoplasm that affects the bones and soft tissues, for which she would have had to undergo chemotherapy that would have irremediably canceled her reproductive capacity.
Your daughter, who came to light last February with a spontaneous birth, is the first child born in Verona – and the first case in Veneto – with a pregnancy obtained with this method, thanks to interdisciplinary work of the Integrated University Hospital of Verona (AOUI), which within the PMA Center – Medically Assisted Procreation – has the Oncofertility Service, for management by medical oncologists and medical doctors reproduction of women with oncological diagnoses in reproductive age.
The first case, in Italy, dates back to 2017. A 34-year-old woman, at the Sant’Orsola Polyclinic in Bologna, had given birth to a child 5 years after the diagnosis of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, thanks to the cryopreservation of the ovarian tissue.
The importance of preserving fertility before tackling oncological treatments
It is estimated that one in 49 women will develop cancer between birth and age 39, which is why fertility preservation it is an important factor. The most used technique for fertility preservation after oncological therapies is oocyte cryopreservation, taken in the case of menstruating girls who can do ovarian stimulation. It was also started a year ago in Verona the most innovative technique of ovarian tissue harvesting and subsequent reimplantation for pre-pubescent girls or for girls who need to have cancer treatment quickly and cannot wait for the time of ovarian stimulation. The operations are performed in mini-laparoscopy, non-invasive, which require a few days of hospitalization and which allow the other therapies to be resumed quickly. This is a complex operation with very small instruments (calibre 3.7 mm/ 4 mm) so as not to compromise the entire organ.
In the case of the new mother, the stimulation of the reimplanted ovarian tissue led to the development of a single follicle which was recovered and inseminated, obtaining an embryo. The assisted in vitro fertilization was performed with the ICSI technique, which allows the insertion of a single spermatozoon inside the mature oocyte (this ability is of fundamental importance in cases in which the seminal sample does not possess the necessary criteria to carry out a IVF). From this process onwards everything went well: positive pregnancy test, regular course, spontaneous birth and the birth of a healthy baby girl.
A success story that confirms the importance of fertility preservation techniques in cancer patients who, otherwise, would risk seeing their reproductive capacity irremediably compromised as a result of chemotherapy. The chances of successfully concluding a pregnancy after reimplantation of cryopreserved ovarian tissue are up to 40%.
So far, more than 130 births have been recorded in the world thanks to this procedure. A result that encourages women who get cancer of childbearing age not to give up the dream of motherhood after recovery.
